Entitlements

Entitlements

Every day, families make choices about their budgets and about where to spend their money. An increasing amount of the federal budget is not subject to similar fiscal discipline. This “entitlement” spending is on cruise control. And the entitlement programs — Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid — take up an ever growing part of our federal budget. They already are 60 percent of federal spending, and that number is only going up. Even worse, these programs are going bankrupt. Medicare is on the brink of bankruptcy. Social Security is already spending more than it is taking in.

These entitlement programs are in danger of sinking our federal budget, and it is irresponsible for the President and Congress to continue pretending that they are not a problem. Entitlement spending has been out-of-control for far too long. Every day they look more and more like empty promises that our children and grandchildren will pay for, but will never see. This status quo is simply unsustainable.

The time is now to work on responsible reforms. This is my single greatest goal and is something that we as a nation must come together to fix.